


Reunion

by leiascully



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-15
Updated: 2018-11-15
Packaged: 2019-08-23 22:30:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 497
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16627628
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/leiascully/pseuds/leiascully
Summary: Emily lived.





	Reunion

**Author's Note:**

> Timeline: n/a  
> A/N: From a tumblr prompt.  
> Disclaimer: _The X-Files_ and all related characters are the property of Chris Carter, 1013 Productions, and Fox Studios. No profit is made from this work and no infringement is intended.

Scully sees her in a crowd and she knows, she just _knows_ , and she’s running after Emily. Mulder shouts her name in that rising tone of surprise and follows her. He catches up quickly - those long legs, that stride that eats up the distance between reason and trouble - and keeps pace with her. If she’s running, he’s running too. She loves that about him.

She follows Emily’s reddish bob through the crowd. Emily looks like she did as a teenager, but hip, wearing a crop top and jeans. She walks the way Mulder does, confident in the face of whatever the world might bring. Not for the first time, Scully wonders who contributed the rest of the DNA, whose heritage she incubated inside her womb, however briefly. Someone passes between them and she loses sight of her daughter. Long lost. She won’t lose her again.

Scully can’t help herself. “Emily!” she calls out, her voice ragged. The Y whips in the wind like a pennant. The crowd between them clears, a momentary reprieve. Emily turns and looks and her eyes widen. Her crop top has a tiny alien head embroidered over her heart. Scully’s cross glints at her throat.

“Oh, shit,” Mulder says. 

“Dana?” Emily says in astonishment, leaning on the word like it’s the only thing keeping her from sagging to the ground.

“You remember,” Scully says helplessly, holding out her hands, although she’s too far away for Emily to even think of taking them. “Oh.”

Emily glances at Mulder and then her eyes focus. “Mister Potato Head,” she whispers.

Mulder puts a finger to his lips. “Don’t blow my cover,” he says, but Scully can see the tears in his eyes. 

“We thought…” Scully says. “We thought you were gone.”

“I don’t know where I was,” Emily says. “And then I was back. Somewhere else. I had…I have a new family.” She smiles and touches the cross. “But I had this too. Of course I remembered.”

“It was a difficult time,” Scully says. “I wasn’t sure you would.”

“I couldn’t forget,” Emily assures her. “I know...I know my mom wasn’t my mom.” She reaches up to touch her face, the high bridge of her nose, the arch of her brow. “I know that you’re my mom.”

“Yes,” Scully whispers. Mulder puts his arm around her to steady her.

“Are you my dad?” Emily asks.

“I don’t know, kiddo,” he says. “Your mom and I weren’t, uh, together at the time, but there was a lot of weird science going on. I could be.”

“That’s cool,” Emily says. “I mean, I guess.”

“It’s cool now,” Scully says. 

Emily checks her phone. “Crap, I have to go to this thing. But maybe you could come with me? And come over for dinner? Meet my other parents? Take it from there?”

“We’d love to,” Scully says. 

“Lead the way,” Mulder says, and they follow the waking dream of their daughter to a high school science fair.


End file.
